Sci-fi and Spanish literature publications call UTB/TSC home

Faculty and students have the opportunity to see their writings in print, thanks to the journal Extrapolation and the magazine Novosantanderino.

Carmen Garcia/Collegian

While Extrapolation concentrates on science fiction, Novosan-tanderino focuses on Spanish poetry and short story submissions.

For Extrapolation, "literature of the fantastic" takes center stage.

Javier Martinez, assistant professor of English and Communication, is the co-editor of the peer-reviewed academic journal.

"We don't publish fiction; what we do is we publish essays about fiction," Martinez said. "Extrapolation is focused on … science fiction, fantasy, horror, comics--all areas of what we refer to as 'literature of the fantastic.'"

About 1,000 copies of the quarterly journal are published.

Martinez and co-editor Donald M. Hassler, professor of English at Kent State University, review essay submissions. If they feel a work is worth "a second look," the essay is sent to the journal's board of editors. The board then issues a detailed reading--positive or negative--usually with revisions.

The average contributor is an academic--tenured professors, graduate students or people with a side interest, Martinez said.

Topics published in the Fall 2004 issue include time travel through hallucinogens and quantum foam, David Cronenberg's film "eXistenZ" and Neil Gaiman's comic series "Sandman."

Extrapolation was founded at the College of Wooster in Ohio in 1959. It moved to Kent State University in 1973. However, troubles in the journal's past led to its moving to UTB/TSC.

"Kent State, because of budget cuts and restrictions, decided they weren't going to publish any academic journals and so they ended up ceasing publication of about a dozen journals," Martinez said.

Martinez knew Extrapolation's editor and suggested that the journal be moved to UTB/TSC.

"He didn't know what was going to happen with the journal and so I said, 'You know, maybe we should move it down to UT-Brownsville,'" Martinez said. "I spoke with the dean, I spoke with the president and I got the OK and so we made the transition."
UTB/TSC pays for Extrapolation's mailing fees, but the journal is mostly self-sufficient, paying for its publishing costs through subscriptions.

Martinez said there are three academic journals of science fiction today--Science Fiction Studies, published in the United States, and Foundation, published in Britain. Extrapolation was the first journal to be devoted to the academic study of science fiction.

"People and academics still kind of look at you funny when you say, 'oh science fiction'--[they reply] 'Well, that's not literary' or 'That's not literature' … but back in 1959, there was already someone there looking ahead and taking it very, very seriously," Martinez said.

The journal's title is also sci-fi in nature.

"I imagine that the age-old conceit of science fiction is that it's trying to gauge the future by what we have today," Martinez said. "In other words you're extrapolating from the present and moving to the future. … We're trying to understand science fiction as a kind of a cultural artifact: What does it tell us about the people who are writing it, the people who are reading and the people who are interested in it?"

Novosantanderino is a literary magazine that publishes poetry and short stories written in Spanish by students, faculty, staff and community members from the area of Nuevo Santander--South Texas and Northern Mexico.

The magazine was a response to student requests for a creative writing publishing outlet, said Juan Antonio Gonzalez, associate professor of Modern Languages and a member of the journal's editorial board. It was founded in the mid-90s by Modern Languages Professor George Green.

"Then, when these requests were received, the initiative to implement a magazine began … providing a forum for students, professors, staff, members of the community [to publish]."

The magazine takes its name from Nuevo Santander, or "New Santander," which was the name of the northeastern province in New Spain in the 18th century. The province stretched from the Río Pánuco in San Luis Potosí, Mexico, to the San Antonio River in what is now South Texas. New Spain eventually became Mexico, and Nuevo Santander became Tamaulipas.

Submissions to the journal must not have been previously published, should be unedited and saved on diskette. Writings need not be historical but must be written in Spanish. The magazine also publishes artwork. Submissions are reviewed by the editorial board.

The editorial board members are Green, Cipriano Cárdenas, Modern Languages Department chair; Roberto Cortina, assistant professor of Modern Languages; Lidia Diaz, assistant professor of Modern Languages; Ramiro Rodriguez, a Spanish instructor at Texas State Technical College-Harlingen; and Glenn Martinez, chair and associate professor of the Modern Languages Department and Literature at the University of Texas-Pan American.

The magazine is published sporadically due to budget constraints, Gonzalez said. The average cost per issue is about $3,500, which allows for the printing of about 750 copies. He said that efforts have been made to raise funds.

One idea is to continue trying to obtain funds from any of the charity organizations who might designate some money to it," Gonzalez said.

He also explained that a partnership between UTB/TSC and UT-Pan Am might defray publication costs.

"Let's see if the two together is easier to publish the issues with funds from the other iinstitution," Gonzalez said.

Novosantanderino was last published in Fall 2002 and is gathering funds for a Summer 2005 issue.

Gonzalez explained that the magazine alternates between publishing poetry and short stories and also dedicates issues to specific cities of Nuevo Santander.

"An issue has been dedicated, for example … to Camargo," Gonzalez said. "Another was dedicated to Mier and we have thought to dedicate other issues" to Reynosa, Matamoros-Brownsville and Laredo.

Specific literary icons of the area also have been honored by the magazine.

"The second one we dedicated to the eminent Chicano writer Rolando Hinojosa-Smith. Another issue we dedicated to Don Américo Paredes," both alumni of Texas Southmost College. Hinojosa-Smith is the Ellen Clayton Garwood Professor of Creative Writing the University of Texas at Austin. Paredes, who died in 1999, was professor emeritus of English and anthropology at UT-Austin.

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